 | | | | Related Healthscout Videos | |
|
By Kirsten Houmann, Ivanhoe Health Correspondent
ORLANDO, Fla. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Trouble reading may be pointing to more than aging eyes. New research suggests it could mean you have glaucoma.
Text Continues Below
Researchers at Johns Hopkins have connected slower spoken reading speeds with glaucoma, an eye disease that can cause blindness. Results show 16 percent of participants without glaucoma had reading impairment -- or a reading speed of slower than 90 words per minute -- while 21.1 percent of those with glaucoma in one eye had reading impairment and 28.4 percent of those with glaucoma in both eyes had the impairment.
Participants with glaucoma in both eyes read 29 words per minute slower than those without the disease and had about twice the chance of trouble reading.
"When glaucoma gets advanced enough, it can cause an effect on the central vision," Pradeep Ramulu, M.D., Ph.D., lead study author and assistant professor of ophthalmology at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Md., told Ivanhoe. "It was that effect on the central vision that seems to actually cause the greatest difficulty with reading."
Dr. Ramulu said difficulty reading, which involves central vision, doesn't usually strike glaucoma patients until the advanced stages of the disease.
"The importance is really early identification of the disease and early treatment of the disease so it doesn't get to this stage," Dr. Ramulu said.
Early symptoms affect peripheral vision, and patients often complain of difficulty seeing things on the side of the road while driving and dimness in one or both eyes.
SOURCE: Ivanhoe interview with Pradeep Ramulu, M.D., Ph.D.; Journal of the American Medical Association,2009;127:82-87
Sign up for a free weekly e-mail on Medical Breakthroughs called First to Know by clicking here.
This article was reported by Ivanhoe.com, who offers Medical Alerts by e-mail every day of the week. To subscribe, go to: http://www.ivanhoe.com/newsalert/.
|
.gif)
